As the prospecting industries, such as the oil-gas and mining industries, discover the easily identified deposits (accumulations) of minerals and oil and gas, the search for new reserves and supplies of these materials becomes increasingly difficult and costly. During the exploration for these accumulations and following the discovery of these accumulations, extensive further analysis of well bore cuttings and core samples is required to determine if it is economically feasible to proceed with commercial development.
Petrographic, x-ray and chemical analysis of the well bore, well bore cuttings and core samples are costly and extremely time-consuming. Thus, it would be desirable to have an apparatus and process of analyzing drill cuttings and well bore, well bore cores which can supplement or replace current time-consuming and analytical processes, but yield greater amounts of data more precisely and rapidly from a larger number of samples within a reasonable period of time.
Satellite and airplane scanning/imaging, hereinafter "scanning", of broad geographic areas has been used before in attempts to locate potential sites for further exploration and/or evaluation. However, due to the coarse spatial resolution of these scanning techniques, they are only useful for locating general areas of potential commercial interest. These scanning techniques usually involve the measurement of reflected solar infrared radiation and emitted black-body infrared radiation. Due to atmospheric interference and absorption, measurement of reflected radiation at shorter than about 0.3 .mu.m wavelengths provides very little, if any, useful information. In addition, satellite and airplane scanning are limited solely to viewing the surface geology of the area.
Thus, it would also be desirable to have an apparatus and process to efficiently scan and image or analyze geological cuttings and/or core samples to determine if further investigation is warranted. In addition, it would be desirable to have a technique which can extend satellite and airplane scanning technology to investigate a wider range of electromagnetic radiation wavelengths to provide additional information in analyzing these samples. Furthermore, it would be desirable to have an apparatus and process which can measure additional properties, such as differential thermal reflectance. This additional measurement is made by the heating of the sample and then measuring the change in thermal infrared radiation (radiant temperature) emitted as the sample cools. Other desirable attributes of an apparatus and process of analysis would be to measure long wavelength reflected IR to determine types of oil in a core sample and the relative saturations of the cuttings or core sample. Additional desirable applications of such an apparatus and process would be to identify and define the location of different clays and cements, provide a means for distinguishing between rocks which are normally difficult to distinguish, such as quartz and opal CT, and delineate porosity variations in the core samples in hopes of providing superior, enhanced oil recovery methods for known discovered deposits/accumulations of minerals and hydrocarbons.